Blog - Lessons

This blog covers different subjects and contains several useful lessons both for beginners, intermediates and advanced jazz guitar players.

Whether you're looking for tips on playing jazz guitar, this blog surely has the information you crave and will help you expand your music knowledge and technical skills.

You will find here tutorials grouped into several distinct categories (Jazz Guitar Lessons, Licks and Transcriptions, Scales and Arpeggios, Chords, Jazz Standards, Music Theory, Guitar Practice Tips, Guitar Gear Reviews, Music Production, Music Reviews, Uncategorized, Guest Posts) as shown in the menu on the right.

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This blog article is related to the video tutorial published on JGL YouTube channel. It contains 10 II V7 jazz bebop guitar patterns with analysis and scale shapes. These lines come from the first chapter of David Baker's book "How To Play Bebop Vol.2 - Learning the bebop language". They correspond to the first ten exercises of the section named "The Use of The II V7 Progression in Bebop".

"Solar" is a jazz standard written by Miles Davis in the key of C minor with four tonal centers that are : C minor, F major, Eb major and Db major. Solar contains essential chord progressions as major and minor II V I. This lesson provides a short harmonic analysis and a chord melody arrangement for guitar with tab, standard notation, chord shapes and audio file.

You will find here a free cheet sheat about major 7 arpeggios. This quick guitar lesson provides a brief description of major 7 arpeggios including neck diagrams and formula charts. This document is available in three versions : PDF (for printing), JPEG and PNG for on-line publication.

What's a Tritone Substitution?

The tritone substitution is one of the most common substitution found in jazz. The basic application of a tritone chord substitution is to take any 7th chord and play another 7th chord that has its root a tritone away from the original. This guitar lesson demonstrates how you can play scales and arpeggios starting from the b5 (a tritone away) of the V7 chord in a II V I chord progression. This way you will highlight altered tones as the b9 and the #11.

What's Octave Playing?

Octave playing is a big part of jazz guitar language, this technique has been popularized by guitarist Wes Montgomery one of the greatest improvisers and jazz genious of all times. Theoretically, the principle is quite easy to understand. You just have to play lines using two simultaneaous notes separated by twelve semitones. In practice, it is more difficult because of the fingerings. Indeed, you have to move two fingers at the same time while keeping the same hand position. This lesson provides guitar diagrams and easy guitar lines for a good mastery of this technique.

Locrian Mode Cheat Sheet For Guitar

The Locrian mode is the seventh mode of the major scale. It has a particular sound because of the b2, b3, b5, b6 and b7. It is probably the least used and the most misunderstood of all of the modes of the major scale. The Locrian mode is usually played over minor seventh flat ninth chords (m7b5).

Aeolian Mode Cheat Sheet

The Aeolian mode (also called "natural minor scale" or "relative minor scale) is the sixth mode of the major scale, it is known as a relative minor to the ionian mode. It is a minor scale containing a minor third (b3), a minor seventh (b7) and a minor sixth (b6).

Mixolydian Scale Guitar Cheat Sheet - PDF / JPEG

The Mixolydian mode, also called dominant scale is the fifth mode of the major scale. It is a major type scale. This is the mode to know when you want to play over dominant chords (not altered). The Mixolydian mode is widely used in jazz and blues music and one of the most important to master.

Lydian Mode Cheat Sheet

The Lydian mode is the fourth mode of the major scale. It is a major type scale very used to play over major chords. It gets interesting when it is played over a major chord, indeed it brings a little bit of tension because of the raised fourth / raised eleventh (#11).

Printable Phrygian Cheat Sheet

The Phrygian mode is the third mode of the major scale. It is one of the three minor modes of the major scale. The Phrygian mode is a minor type scale, indeed it contains a b3. It can be played over minor chords but it is rarely used because of the b2 scale tone.

Printable PDF / JPEG Dorian Mode Cheat Sheet

The Dorian mode is the second of the seven musical modes.It is a minor type scale because of its minor third (b3), often the first choice to play over minor chords and one of the most important scales to know.

The Dorian mode is built with a root (1), a second (2), minor third (b3), fourth (4), perfect fifth (5), sixth (6) and minor seventh (b7).

Printable PDF / JPEG Ionian Mode Cheat Sheet

The Ionian mode (aka major scale) is the first of the seven musical modes. The other Greek modes are Dorian, Phrygian, Lydian, Mixolydian, Aeolian and Locrian modes. The Ionian mode has exactly the same notes as the major scale and surely the first scale to learn for a beginner musician.

The major scale consists of a root (1), second (2), major third (3), fourth (4), fifth (5), sixth (6) and major seventh (7).

Octave playing technique involves playing the same note on two strings separate by one octave. An octave is 12 semitones higher than the root note. You will find in this blog post a new video from the YouTube Channel, containing 10 dominant octave licks with tabs and standard notation overlayed.

What's An Inverted Chord?

The notes of a chord whether it is a triad (containing just three notes) or a tetrad (built with four notes) can be reshuffled in different order. The name of the chord will still remain the same, but the bass will not necessarily the root note. This is the lowest note (the bass note) that determines the name of the inverted chord. So, chord inversion simply refers to which note is in the bass. You will find here some example for a better understanding of what are inverted chords.